"Only the poor pay taxes"... This was one of the most interesting expressions in a comic movie I saw years before. It was about the prime-minister of the Spanish king, who was a greedy man stripping all possible from the poor in favor of the aristocracy. And when this minister was replaced by the king, the new one established taxes on the rich and collected much gold in king's treasury. But before the replacement the old minister was saying: "Only the poor pay taxes..."
Read more...Today almost all the markets had crashed, after a publication of protocols of an old FED meeting held on March 13th. On that meeting it becomes clear that the FOMC doubts on starting the QE3. Panicked by this the markets went on bear tactics and everything went down, while dollar - up. But let's see what exactly happened. On March 27th (2 weeks after the protocolled meeting) Bernanke said that may be QE3 will soon start. At that day the FED Chairman must have known of the March 13th meeting, as he has chaired it. So Bernanke knows of the minutes of the meeting and knows that they will be published on April 3rd. Anyway on March 27th he demonstrates that the QE3 is highly probable. The reaction of markets then was bullish.
Read more...German government has undermined its own efforts to save the euro and the EU as a whole, after it negotiated a 6,3% rise in salaries of public-sector workers. Chancellor Angela Merkels team faced a risk of general strike of public workers, after their union, called Verdi, placed an ultimatum and requested a 6,5% rise in salaries. The syndicalists rejected a 3,3% offer from government and insisted on 6,5%. Finally the government accepted 6,3% making itself look funny on a stage of all-EU-wide spending cuts.
Read more...Today a hesitating talk from Bernanke has made most markets to explode, starting a new rally, motivated by inflationary expectations. Bernanke said he is not sure, but maybe he will print some more money to help further the economy that already has given some signals of recovery... At the moment investors heard this, the markets of almost everything skyrocketed, killing irreversibly any hopes of bear-investors.
Read more...The news that Saudi Arabia is intending to act on oil markets to press the prices down led to a small 1% decrease of the crude-oil-price on Tuesday. On that day came the information that the top oil producer has hired 11 supertankers (2 million barrels each) to transport an extra oil to United States in response to rising oil prices. On the same day the Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said that the kingdom was pumping 9,9 million barrels per day - the highest level in decades. He added that they have readiness to supply every request from customers and Saudi Arabia is willing to turn the taps to maximum capacity of 12,5 million barrels per day immediately. Months ago Saudi Arabia announced that it finds $100 per barrel as "ideal" oil-price.
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